OCR Text |
Show 168 MAMMALIA. less remarkable; a sort of clavicle especially, which is common to both shoulders, placed before the ordinary clavicle, and analogous to the fourchette in birds. Finally, besides their five nails to each foot, the males have a spur on the hinder ones, perforated by a canal whi~h transmits the liquid s~creted ~y a gland situated on the mner surface of the thigh. It IS asserted that the wounds it inflicts are envenomed. These animals have no external conch to their ears, and their eyes are very small. The Monotremata are only found in New Holland, and have been discovered since the settlement of the English. Two genera of them are known. EcHIDNA, Cuv.-TACHYGLossus, Illig. The elongated slender muzzle of the Spiny Ant-Eaters, terminated by a small mouth, contains an extensible tongue similar to that of the Ant-Eaters and Pangolins, and like them, they feed on Ants. They have no teeth, but their palate is furnished with several rows of small recurved spines. Their short feet have each five very long and stout nails fitted for digging; and the upper surface of the body is covered with spines like that of the Hedgehog. It appears, that when in danger, they also possess the faculty of rolling them· selves into a ball. Their tail is very short; their stomach ample and almost globular, and their crecum moderate; the penis is ter· min a ted by four tubercles. There are two species. E. hystrix; Ornithorhynchus hystrix, Home ; Myrmecophaga aculeata, Shaw. (The Spiny Echidna.) Completely covered with large spines. E. setosa; Ornitlwr. setosus, Home. (The Bristly Echidna.) Is covered with hair, among which the spines are half hidden. Some naturalists consider it as a mere variety from age. ORNITHORHYNCHus, Blumenb.-PLA TYPus, Shaw. The elongated, and at the same time singularly enlarged and fiat· tened muzzle of the Ornithorhynchi presents the closest external resemblance to the bill of a Duck, and the more so as its edges are among the numerous physicians who daily visit the colony of Port Jackson. ~sto the anatomy of the Ornithorhynchus, see the detailed monography on that subJec4 published by M. Meckel, also the Memoirs of Sir Ev. Home, my Lessons of Com· parative Anatomy, Vol. V, and the Memoirs of l\:1. Geoffroy StHilaire, MelD· d~ Mus. tome XV. EDENTA.TA. 169 similarly fut•nished with small tt·ansverse Iamirtre. They have no teeth except at the bottom of the mouth, where there are two throughout, without roots, with flat crowns, and composed like those of the Orycteropus, of little vertical tubes. There is a membrane to the fore feet, which not only unites the toes, but extends far beyond the nails; in the hind feet the membrane terminates at the root of the nails ; two characters, which, with the flattened tail, make them ·aquatic animals. Their tongue is in a manner double: one in the bill bristled with villosities; and a second on the base of the first, which is thicker, and furnished anteriorly with two little fleshy points .. The stomach is small, oblong, and has the pylorus near the cardia. The crecum is small; and many salient and parallel laminre are visible in the intestines. The penis has only two tubercles. The Ornithorhynchi inhabit the rivers and marshes of New Holland in the neighbourhood of Port Jackson. Two species only are known, one with smooth, thin, reddish fur, the Ornitltor!tyncltus paradoxtts, Blumenb., and the other with blackish~brown, flat and frizzled hair. Probably these are only varieties of age. Voy. de Peron, I, pl. xx.xiv. ORDER VII. PACHYDERMATA. · The Edentata terminate the series of unguiculated a~imals and we have just seen that there are some of them whos; nails are so large, and so envelope the extremities of the toes as. to approximate them in a certain degree to the hoofed ammals. They still, however, possess the faculty of bending these toes round various objects, and of seizing with more or less force. The total deficiency of this faculty characterizes the hoofed animals. Using their feet merely as supporters, they are never furnished with clavicles; their fore-arm is always in a state of pronation, and they are reduced to the nee ess1· ty of feed·m g on vegetables. Their forms and habits present much less variety than those of the Unguiculata, and the.y can hardly be divided into more than two orders, those WhiCh ruminate, and those which do not; but these latter, VoL. I.-W |